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Another Court Rules Religious Nonprofit Can Avoid Complying With Birth Control Benefit

The decision from a federal court in Florida comes just before the Roberts Court considers stepping back into the legal fight over the birth control benefit.

The decision from a federal court in Florida comes just before the Roberts Court considers stepping back into the legal fight over the birth control benefit. Shutterstock

Read more of our articles on challenges to the Affordable Care Act’s birth control benefit here.

A second federal court in Florida ruled Tuesday that despite its most recent rule changes, the Obama administration has still not gone far enough to placate religious conservatives who object to the Affordable Care Act’s birth control benefit.

Tuesday’s ruling came in Christian and Missionary Alliance Foundation v. Burwell, a case involving a religious nonprofit organization that owns and operates assisted living communities and religious colleges. The organization claims that its religious objection to contraception precludes it from both complying with the birth control benefit and participating in the accommodation process set forth by the Obama administration.

That process requires only that objecting organizations notify the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in writing that they are claiming a religious exemption. The organizations must then provide the government identification of their health coverage plan for employees and contact information to the insurer operating the plan so the administration can step in and coordinate birth control coverage for those employees who wish to have it.

But, according to the religiously affiliated nonprofits like the Christian and Missionary Alliance Foundation challenging the birth control benefit, any act, no matter how remote, that facilities employees from being able to access contraception is tantamount to providing that contraception directly, and therefore a violation of their religious beliefs.

Religious conservatives insist they should qualify for the same exemption from coverage provided to churches and synagogues that would leave employees who want or need contraception coverage on their own.

U.S. District Court Judge John Steele agreed.

“Compelling plaintiffs to identify their providers or administrators to the HHS clearly facilitates the government’s ability to implement contraceptive coverage for plaintiffs’ female employees,” the court wrote. “While plaintiffs cannot preclude the government from such implementation, the identification requirement compels plaintiffs to become excessively entangled in the process of providing coverage for services which their sincerely held religious beliefs prohibit.”

The court charged that the government can take “legitimate steps to determine the identity of the insurers and administrators,” so as to facilitate contraception coverage, but it did not say what those steps would look like beyond the identification process its order blocks.

“[P]laintiffs have no ability to compel the government or their insurers/administrators to follow their religious beliefs,” the court wrote. “But for the purpose of determining whether a requirement imposes a substantial burden on religious exercise, the Court draws the line after notification of eligibility but before compelled identification of an insurer/administrator.”

The legal battle over the birth control benefit has not subsided since last summer’s Hobby Lobby ruling. Federal courts of appeals in Denver and New Orleans are considering similar challenges to the accommodation process for religiously affiliated nonprofits.

Attorneys for the University of Notre Dame have asked the Roberts Court to overturn an appellate court ruling requiring them to comply with the accommodation process in order to avoid offering contraceptive coverage for university students and employees.

The Supreme Court is scheduled to consider taking up Notre Dame’s request at the end of the month.